[Mz]

Not everyone does what they do to make a buck. If Einstein had failed, the world today would be a different place. Paying him money to make him feel better about that would not begin to make up for what the world would have missed out on.

You are basically talking about insurance. I was in insurance and I have a pretty low opinion of it. Insurance is billed as "risk management." It's billed as "we will be there for you in your time of need." It would be more honest to claim it is kind of like Las Vegas, but in order to hit the jack pot, something really bad has to happen to you first. Real risk management is about trying to make sure bad things don't happen in the first place. It isn't about going "Oh, look, now that life has crapped all over me, I have a big check to make my suffering seem somehow okay."

Let me respectfully suggest you go do something else. I don't see how you can begin to value unborn dreams. How could you possibly know that Microsoft would be worth billions until after the fact? How can you possibly tell in advance which two guys in some basement or garage will be world changers and which will be remembered as "losers"?

[Nebyl]

Hi Mz,

First of all thank you for your input, but I think there is misunderstanding here and it is probably my fault as I'm not giving enough details for now. So allow me to clarify : it is not an insurance.

You put it awfully obnoxious when you say that people can predict a billion dollar company when it is still in a basement, but isn't what investors and incubators do? They believe in the "born idea" and they nurture it by supporting it with investments, training, coaching, tips etc... It's a way to predict the value of those dreams, and drop the failure rate to the minimum (38% in the case of YC). So what about an abstract layer above all this that can make drop this rate even more?

I will respectfully decline your suggestion to do something else, because the idea is maybe strange, but it is viable even if I can't talk more about it and most important: I really believe in it.

[paulhauggis]

"Not everyone does what they do to make a buck."

Then they aren't in business and shouldn't be called an entrepreneur.

[Mz]

So add one word: Not everyone does what they do just to make a buck.

If money is the only reason you are in business, you probably aren't worth buying anything from. Con artists, pyramid schemes, thieves -- those people care about money or profit first, a whole lot of other things much less or not at all. Business people should be trying to first add real value to the world and second get a fair share of that value coming back to them. Otherwise, we have lots of other less nice words for them than entrepreneur, such as profiteer.

Have a happy holiday.

[Nebyl]

Hi Mz, I don't understand why you are judging an idea with such cruel words without knowing how it works yet. And yet I'm still interested in your opinion without having you treating me as a scam or conman. Thank you for being more comprehensive and a little bit less accusing.